


Significant Fractions

by biseelie



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Mortality, Post-Battle of New York (Marvel), Thor-centric, Thor/Jane if you squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-09
Updated: 2016-08-09
Packaged: 2018-08-07 16:01:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7720966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/biseelie/pseuds/biseelie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Don’t ask questions you don’t want answers to. Or just avoid human contact. That’s probably the safest option.</p>
<p>Or, an evening conversation between teammates.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Significant Fractions

**Author's Note:**

> Fills the prompt for "it is a truth universally acknowledged" on my (arbitrarily generated) August Bingo Card. I swear I tried to write a cracky spouse search, but it managed to devolve into this.
> 
> The opening quote is, of course, from “Pride and Prejudice”.
> 
> Set some time after the Battle of New York, pre-AoU.
> 
> Content Note: discussions of mortality, death

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife. There is another truth: that he will eventually, regardless of his marital status, meet Death and pass on into an afterlife. Who, or indeed _what_ determines this afterlife is determined is under some debate.

Thor knows, as is foretold, that one day,

> “he will fall in the fight,  
>  the Golden Prince against the Great Beast,  
>  the foe born, borne by the betrayer,  
>  in a far-flung fight for the Golden Realm”.

There is a less cryptic prophecy, but that one is hidden deep in an Asgardian palatial library. One day after swordsmanship practice, Loki had come to him after happening across an old song which referenced to those contents. Thor had warily followed him into a library as Loki looked for the original prophecy.

“You are an oaf,” Loki had said, “but at this point in time, you are taller than I am, and magic cannot be used once inside this library. Not that magic is any concern of _yours_.”

It took them quite a while to make them to the hall that Loki said contained the prophecy. Just as Thor had been about to ask if they were lost, the two of them had found themselves in front of a wooden door, oddly out of place in the sleek decor that blanketed all of Asgard.

“I’ll handle this,” Loki had said, opening the lock with a spark of magic.

When the two of them had finally managed to get the door open, they had seen a room already lit by torches. Odin had already been waiting in the room, standing in front of a bookshelf full of scroll cases. He was holding a particularly thick scroll case (made out of wood from Vanaheim, if Thor had paid attention to his morning studies correctly) in his left hand, while the other held Gugnir. He had made a sweeping motion with his right hand as Loki and Thor traded a look and followed him out of the library. The doors had slammed shut and the padlocked chains had reset behind them.

Odin had talked to several courtiers as they made their way to an unoccupied study. Once they had arrived, they had sat down in low stools arranged around a window. “Courage and the desire for knowledge are both valuable traits, ones present in every great ruler. This does not mean that you should jump into the abyss of the unknown. The Norns are powerful beings. They do not share their wisdom lightly. If you seek free knowledge of your future, you must live through it.”

“There is an entire Hall of Prophecy,” Loki pointed out idly.

“And it is used by those already burdened with the gift of foresight,” Odin said. “Do not seek to enlist yourself into those ranks. Thor, leave us.”

 

As far as Thor knows, Loki never went back into that library, not even after the rumours that the prophecy of the end of Asgard had finally been made. Odin had suggested that the one in that prophecy might not be him. Regardless, Thor has no more information on this subject than he did when he was a teenager. He does know that he will fall in battle, and he will be taken to either Valhalla or Fólkvangr to live out his afterlife. _Still_ , he reflects as he calls down lightning to disable a Doombot, that will not happen this day.

The team retires to the tower afterwards, celebrating their victory. Iron Man and Bruce Banner disappear, returning to their labs, leaving the two S.H.I.E.L.D. agents and Steve Rogers nursing various beverages around a table.

A drunk Barton seems to be trying to goad Rogers into drinking some alcohol. The Captain has been drinking glasses of orange juice all night, excusing himself with the fact that alcohol has no effect on his system. Clint is holding Natasha’s mostly empty bottle of vodka, trying to tip it into the team leader’s glass in the attempt to form a concoction known as a ‘screwdriver’. Finally, Steve grabs Clint’s hand, wrenching the bottle from him, tipping it into his mouth. Then, Steve downs the contents of both Clint’s beer mug and his own remaining orange juice, before picking him up and draping him over his shoulders.

“Good night, everyone,” he says as he gathers up the glasses and places them into a nearby sink.

“Didn’t know you had that in you, old man,” Clint burbles happily from the fireman’s carry. As Steve walks towards the elevator, he starts humming an off-key rendition of the _Dog Cops_ theme song.

“Old man?” Thor asks Natasha. It is dark outside, or at least as dark as Manhattan can get, but they both show no signs of moving.

“Steve was born around ninety years ago,” she responds. Thor enjoys talking to Lady Romanoff and appreciates her direct manner.

“Ah! Midgardian humour,” Thor responds. “Are you all so young?”

“I’m fifty-six,” Natasha says flatly. She pauses, before pursing her lips and looking at him. “How old are you?”

“Thre- Just over a thousand of your years,” Thor corrects himself. “I still have much more to learn.”

“I see,” Natasha says. “And how old do you think Stark is?”

“Perhaps three hundred?” Thor muses.

Natasha sets down the bottle of alcohol that she’s holding. “Thor, the average lifespan of a human in this part of the world is just over ninety years.”

“Ninety… years? And of other parts of Midgard?”

“About the same. Or less.”

“But there are great warriors among you! Men and woman stout of heart and spirit.”

“That which makes me was forged by a dying star,” Natasha quotes, “but man is still made of dust and ashes. We are fragile creatures, Thor. We die quickly. Easily.”

Thor is silent for a long moment. “On my world, the strong and the virtuous live lives fuelled by the ardour of their spirits until we fall in combat. It is like this for nearly all of us.”

Natasha offers him her alcohol. It is not as sweet as mead, but right now, even Kvasir’s brew would dry out and stick in his throat. “I had a brother,” he says. At her look, he corrects himself. “ _Another_ brother. My queen mother became pregnant, but it was an unexpected event and the child was born sickly. He died in his sleep one night. Barely grown, even by your standards.”

“What was his name?” Natasha asks, adjusting the hems of the shirt she changed into after the battle. Her hands ghost over her stomach.

“Baldr, he was named. Baldr the Brave. Baldr the Bold,” Thor says, laughing harshly. “Midgardians. As one of you, he would have had only four? Five times that? You live for mere moments in our lives.”

“Why did you come back to Midgard?” Black Widow asks.

“I was banished here,” Thor says. Natasha nods, prompting him further. “I had to bring Loki to justice. I am here for the people of Midgard now. The Lady Jane.”

“It is not a mere moment to her,” Natasha stands up. “Nor to any of us.”

 

There was a period in Asgardian history when they venerated the stars as much as they worshipped Yggdrasil, one that occurred before they learned to harness either force. Asgard’s original star is still shining and will still be shining when Thor goes to face his death. Perhaps all of the Æsir will die out before that star does. And yet, Mjølnir was forged from metals gathered from an exploded star.

Thor walks over to the window. As he looks upon the city below him, Thor calls his hammer to his hand. Millions of humans live here. How do they not all fret their lives away? He hefts his hammer, looks at the rune inscribed upon it.

**Author's Note:**

> The MCU wikia places Natasha’s date of birth in 1984, which makes her much too young for any of that fun Soviet Red Room stuff. As such, I’ve bumped her age up. She would have received a bastardized super soldier serum as part of the Red Room training which would deal with the aging stuff. (Anyways, in 616-verse, she was born pre-WWII. No reason only the male MCU superheroes should get to be above 40).
> 
> The prophecy reference is my tremendously poor attempt at a simple Eddaic meter. I haven’t quite gotten the hang of lifts yet.


End file.
